I know there’s been widespread criticism of many in the media for not confronting former Rangers EBT beneficiaries, now working alongside ‘proper’ journalists, for not holding ex-players to account for the enormous sums of money diverted from the tax man. I’ve spoken to a few journos who have tried to make headway on this story but been denied comment, access, or even contact details from colleagues.
The defensive line on not discussing this subject was originally “My EBT was legal and is a private finance matter”. This changed last year when these EBTs were found to have broken tax laws at appeal, when the line was changed to “This is a private finance matter which is subject to appeal”.
All fair enough. A consequence of the original legal status and ongoing appeals is that no one has broken ranks on those responsible for imposing this state of affairs on a football club, the tax man, or individual players.
The Daily Record today report HMRC are pursuing players for the payment of tax on EBTs. My understanding is that many (if not all) players received a letter from the “Club” indemnifying them from tax. Watch how quickly you’re told “Not this club, it was the club that died”.
You’re going to need patience for this one, it could have years to run, but I expect ranks will break eventually.
You can read subtext, can’t you? The Times report today that Celtic and the SPFL have written to the Scottish Government telling them to keep their noses out of the running of football clubs. This was after the Government responded to pressure from Celtic to repeal the Offensive Behaviour at Football’ Act by hitting them on a subject they knew would cause conflict with some fan groups.
Push on the Offensive Behaviour Act and watch what happens with the Fan on the Board issue which you enjoy so much but seemed to have lost momentum.
Politics is a dirty business. All this to deflect criticism of an ill-conceived, ineffective, bad law, instead of just repealing it, which will happen as soon as we no longer have a majority government. Anyway, Don’t Blame Me…….
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Big Nan,
If you answer my questions honestly, and let the readers decide what stands up.
Did I ask you to treat my response in confidence ?
What did you do with that response ?
Bobby,
Soo jealous. Wish I could have bought you a Guinness but I’ve good reasons for not going so I won’t beat myself up.
Were the rebel songs allowed where you bhoys watered?
The dub mate claims its the gov pushing their agenda.
Hope youre well
Hail Hail
http://www.celticfc.net/news/10269?
Celtic Football Club statement
By: Newsroom Staff on 31 Mar, 2016 16:58
IN response to articles which have appeared today in mainstream media regarding a Scottish Government Consultation, Celtic today made the following statement:
‘The SPFL, which has made a submission on this matter, speaks for and represents all 42 professional football clubs in Scotland, so we would question the motivation of media reports which seem to single out and misrepresent Celtic Football Club on this issue.
Celtic has been open and transparent in taking part in this consultation process.
In the same way that Celtic has continually challenged inappropriate and unworkable Government legislation being used in areas such as the Offensive Behaviour Act, we see no reason why legislation should be imposed on football clubs over this particular matter.
Celtic’s supporters are the lifeblood of the Club. We already enjoy very close, regular and meaningful liaison with our supporters through various means and in fact, as we stated in our submission, we positively encourage supporter involvement and engagement.’
loinroars67,
who are you calling a copulation simulator ?
I dont need to lie down
LIONSROAR67 & HAMILTONTIM – I did NOT say that all in the TRUSS are SNP – what I did imply clearly is that they do what they always do and oppose Celtic – this time by adopting the SNP agenda.
And of course you do what you always do when you don’t want to answer a substantive issue – you select a word or phrase out of context, over-simplify, and ‘bleat’ about it – answer the point – are the Truss backing the SNP in their desired ‘right to buy’ clubs by any and all fans?
Canamalar it looks like OCD obsession on 31st March 2016 5:41 pm –
Poetic licence there John
No need for the personal abuse
Timaloy29,
thats the strongest statement I’ve read from the club on any issue
Ditto
BCMCUWP@5:34 – that answer is tantamount to ‘sliding under a snake whilst wearing a top hat’
Love it when Celtic call out the media.
Although they don’t do it nearly often enough.
Lionroars67,
being in the pocket of anyone is as beyond personal abuse as I’m willing to take, I dont mind arsehole, clown dickhead, but call me corrupt, well that’s litigious and short of litigation how else do I show my disgust ?
I find a bit of name calling the cheapest form of satisfaction, especially when he prefers to avoid answering two simple questions that would make everything clear.
Did I reply courteously with an update I requested be treated with confidentiality ?
What did he do with that reply ?
its no hard, until then I had every respect for big nan, since then, zero respect, and I don’t waste courtesy on people I don’t respect
FFS its all happening today, all out war on CQN and the tic give a barely disguised two fingers to the SNP government. I picked the wrong day to give up the glue!
Fan involvement/club ownership has been on the Celtic Trust agenda for a damn sight longer than it has on the SNP’s.
Canamalar it looks like OCD obsession on 31st March 2016 5:56 pm –
I never personally called you out on anything
I asked you to cut out personal abuse, no other judgments on you whatsoever……..read back
What i got back from you was no respect and personal abuse
Dont bore me and the blog with pathetic attempts to justify it
Windies need 8 from 6 to win
kill ultra on 31st March 2016 4:47 pm
The answer to those questions are really simple and I will give you as full an explanation as I can.
Canamalar, Morrissey and Auldheid had banged the drum for the resolution and had obtained the appropriate numbers to get the resolution on the agenda.
To be honest, at that point Celtic didn’t like it and indicated that they, as a board, would vote the resolution down.
I can’t quite remember the sequence of events which led to Morrissey going to Celtic Park with the papers, but whoever was in charge knew he was coming and directed that the people at the front desk simply refuse him entry. Without explicitly saying so, he was viewed as a troublemaker and was essentially just thrown out.
This was cearly wrong,
Not only was it wrong, it was also a really stupid and disrespectful thing to do.
I will pause there for an observation. At the time, the board and staff of Celtic PLC were not necessarily used to having to deal with resolutions from the floor. They didn’t have the experience or sense to simply take in the statutory paper work and deal with as all PLC’s have to. They have that experience now and I don’t think this would happen again no matter what the resolution asked or who tabled it.
However, wrong is wrong and that day they were wrong.
Arrangements were made for Morrissey to return.
As you said, Canamalar was overseas as was Auldheid.
A couple of days before (I think) Morrissey was due to return to Celtic Park I received phonecalls from Auldheid, and a few others, including Morrissey, asking if I would accompany him to Celtic Park.
By this time, representatives of the board realised a mistake had been made and were already reviewing what their stance was om Res 12 in light of information sent to them by e-mail by Auldheid.
I agreed to go and contacted the company secretary to say I would be coming in with Morrissey. In the same conversation, I took the opportunity to discuss what the resolution was trying to achieve with the company secretray ( as I understood it ) and pointed him in the direction of certain rules and regulations which I don’t believe Celtic had fully considered at that time.
These, when taken together with what Auldheid had sent them, suggested to me and others that Celtic needed to reconsider.
The company secretary said he would speak to the CEO and agreed to meet myself and Morrissey the following day.
That day, I met Morrissey who genuinely believed that he would once again be shown the door in an unceremonious fashion. He wasn’t, and instead we were met in a polite and professional manner by the company secretary and the CEO.
It was at this meeting I realised and that the then newly appointed company secretary and I knew one another from years back when we both practised as solicitors and so our conversation was much more relaxed as we both knew the kind of person we were dealing with.
The conversation proceeded and reasonably quickly the decision was made to proceedurally adjourn the resolution at the AGM. The implications of this were fully discussed by myself and the Company Secretary at the time and it was agreed that I would prepare a draft statement to be read out at the AGM by the chairman.
Both the CEO and the Company Secretary acknowledged that there was more to do on the aims of the resolution than they realised. They had thought that the resolution was only being brought to ensure that Celtic had asked questions of the SFA about the issues in hand. They had thought that the resolution was, if you like, an anti board resolution. They quickly realised that was not the intention at all — although it did carry with it the intention of being able to hold the board to account as is the right of any shareholder in any company.
We were shown correspondence with the SFA which proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that Celtic had indeed asked questions as far back as December 2011 ( this was Nov 2013) and that they had received a shortish, curt and, to be honest, sharp reply from the SFA. Follow up correspondence asking further questions received a similar reply — which might have been even more curt and if anythng dismissive of Celtic and its officers.
You may well be aware that at least one of these answers was drafted and sent to Ibrox for approval.
In any event, at the meeting at Celtic Park it was me who either suggested an adjournment or brokered an adjournemnt or even agreed to an adjournment of you like. Before leaving the meeting we had a course of action agreed in principle which I then said I would run by the others by telephone.
Accordingly, in that sense they were consulted but in truth that was a formality as I had a mandate from them to do one thing and one thing only and that was to, if possible, persuade Celtic to get on board the resolution and keep it live. How to do that was decided more or less there and then because it had to be.
The alternative was an open discussion at the AGM where if you forced the board into a vote without giving them the time to explore the facts, legals and circumstances as we believed and knew it to be, then history told us that the board would vote against the resolution as a matter of habit and send you away with the words ” If you come up with anything else come back next year and we will see where we are”.
That attitude and course of action would have been a fudge and of no purpose. The fact is that Res 12 was live at that point: It was formally on an agenda and we were able to persuade the board that this was not just some crowd of lunatics having a go at them, but a whole series of shareholders who had a genuine concern, who they had a duty to represent and who would hold them to account of they didn’t.
Accordingly, by adjourning we legally and formally kept it ion the agenda and had it read into the minutes by Ian Bankier.
The Adjournment process was a proceedural and advocacy vistory for shareholders as no resolution from ordinary shareholders had ever made it past the agenda stage before — they had always been voted down and defetaed — rightly or wrongly.
The notion that any PLC board will always be right is clearly an incorrect one and the quicker Celtic PLC recognise that the better.
The shareholders of Celtic PLC have bright, intelligent, professional, resourceful and clever people among their number and that is something which I think, and hope, the board are coming to realise. They should be viewed as an asset and not the enemy.
The more you engage with shareholders, the more you will respect and trust theur judgement in certain areas. Further, the more you engage with them, the more the officers of the company, who have a bloody difficult job at the best of times, will earn the trust and respect of the shareholders — provided what all partie say and do is on the level, open and honestly discussed and decided upon.
The more you engage with people on this basis, the easier it is to say ” Sorry, but with respect you are wrong in that and I disagree with you for these reasons.”
The more often you deliver that message and justify why you disagree the more often you will actually be listened to, your point of view taken on board, considered and respected — even if they still disagree with you.
I don’t agree with everything that the PLC board does at Celtic park — sure I don’t even agree with the PLC model in reality — but I know how a PLC should operate and how the rules of the company should be applied in formal meetings.
So – we applied those rules and we agreed to adjourn and then reconvene after the AGM.
We have been reconvening ever since — and yes from time to time disagreeing ever since about what to do next or where to go or how to interpret a situation or a reply.
But in the main there is dialogue and co-operation.
There is then the difficulty of what you report, how you report, to whom do you report and at times you are asked to keep your powder dry for on reason or another — and guess what? Sometimes you do — and sometimes you don’t because you have a duty to come back to those you represent.
Sometimes that is difficult because of the pragmatics and sometimes it is difficult because of the consequences.
However, can I end with just saying this.
I am no fan of vitriol and accustaion. I am no fan of anger and irrational or emotive argument — because in my experience it gets you nowhere.
I can disagree with Peter Lawwell, or Auldheid, or Canamalar or whoever ( Jesus you should try living in my house! – We can’t agree on the time) but at the end if the day no matter who these people are, no matter what their title or position, or whether they or anyone else thinks they are important or unimporatant or whatever — they are all people. Just people trying to get a job done in a way you might agree with or disagree with and when you disagree with someone one day, as sure as eggs is eggs the sun will set in the evening and will rise the following morning and you will still have to deal with the same people the following day.
There should be no vitriol on here. By all means ask a question, get an answer, agree or disagree, express a point of view — even express it by saying ” That’s shite” if you want — but please don’t keep seeing reds under beds and give some of us some credit for being able to honestly stand up and be counted for what we think is right in any given set of circumstances and to anyone — even punters with Celtic ties and a spare cup of tea.
Hopefully, that answers your question and maybe some that haven’t been asked.
Cheers.
Good evening CQN, enjoy your night
Windies need three from three.
Looks like WI V England
MR PASTRY
I’ll have to take your word for that,I’m afraid. But since you brought the term up,here’s a wee song for you.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=T_ZBqpEUbik
lionroars67,
you chose who to call out on personal abuse, just like the meeja scum, you made a decision on who you would decide was in the wrong, not a word on big nan making accusations of corruption, just go for your choosen victim, snake meeja tactics and read like a book, no justification needed snakehips, as I said go fourth and multiply.
Canamalar it looks like OCD obsession on 31st March 2016 6:08 pm –
You going to the game tomorrow ? Are you in Scotland ?
By the way — see that ” The Celtic supporters are the lifeblood of the club” line — can we not afford a PR office who can come up with a different way of saying that or who can say something — anything — that avoids using that line ad nauseam.
We know what the Celtic supporters are — but dear God we don’t need to be told the same condescending set of words time after time after time.
” Celtic fans are the lifeblood of the club — but we don’t agree with fan ownership”
” Celtic fans are the lifeblood of the club —- but its still £3;00 for a hotdog”
” Celtic fans are the lifeblood of the club — and I am wearing odd socks, have booked a holiday in Tim Buck Too and have a boil on my arse”
Jeezo — eejits!
LionsRoar,
Dont engage with this man .He is not worth the bother.
I think the Club has got the message that a large section of our Support have had enough of “being nice”.
The recent announcements re the semis which pointedly failed to mention our opponents and this response to an attempt to further destabilise our support gives me hope that we can reunite under one banner.
Be under no doubt there is a concerted effort being made by the Hun to weaken Celtic by causing dissension amongst the support through misleading media stories and by infiltration of Celtic sites.
When I read original story I immediately thought this will provide fodder for a further barney on the blog tonight. Hopefully the Celtic Statement will diffuse the situation but I wouldn’t rule out someone kicking it off anyway.
In last couple of days, we had the “PL voted for King”, Tierney to Southampton & today Celtic join SFA to prevent fan involvement.
We are being played, lets give the f*ckers their answer by giving the Bhoys the greatest backing ever on Saturday & roaring them on to another vital victory.
Let’s also to try & heal our differences here on the blog, I’m not suggesting we all get pally wally, fight & disagree but with an united underlying love & commitment to Celtic.
We are on the one road.
Jerry Cornelius on 31st March 2016 6:14 pm
Thanks Jerry, no worries whatsoever
Not pleasant to be described as similar to media scum
People like him are the antithesis of what we should stand for.
Lionroars67,
no in Scotland now but will be soon, maybe meet you for a development game again and a few pints, clear the air.
hail hail
JERRY CORNELIUS on 31ST MARCH 2016 6:20 PM
People like him are the antithesis of what we should stand for.
Res12 has a very limited chance of succeeding, but despite John we all wish Res12 every success
Jerry..,
do you know what that means ?
CANAMALAR IT LOOKS LIKE OCD OBSESSION on 31ST MARCH 2016 6:23 PM
Lionroars67,
no in Scotland now but will be soon, maybe meet you for a development game again and a few pints, clear the air.
hail hail
OK John no problem
Despite John it wouldn’t have got off its arse and you know it
Definitely away now you can all breathe lol
Celtic’s statement today illustrates that where the is a prima facie case to be answered, Celtic will speak out unequivically.
What they won’t do is to respond to every piece of “tittle-tattle’ emanating from ‘loose-cannons’ on social- media, with nothing to lose.
Can anyone imagine, bearing in mind some of ‘junk’ that is thrown about on this site by so-called supporters; Celtic being controlled by these type people – we wouldn’t last as long as Gary Neville.
no justification needed snakehips, as I said go fourth and multiply. – See more at: http://www.celticquicknews.co.uk/tax-man-cometh-scottish-gov-front-after-oba-protests/comment-page-5/#comment-2803724
It should be forth not fourth
It seems we are back were we started, personality, doesn’t matter how important the res is, its a personality competition, miss world would have pushed this through much quicker and sold you out in a minute, I’m brash, in your face and that’s how just about everyone I know knows me. In real life and bloglife, don’t call me corrupt and I wont abuse yo its really simple.
for you Jerry, froth is probably more apt
THE RESOLUTE MR PASTRY on 31ST MARCH 2016 4:46 PM
I see the ‘Truss’ are again doing what the ‘Truss’ always does – opposing Celtic FC and taking the SNP side in the ‘fan ownership’ debate – why? – because it suits their political agenda.
This cabal is a malignancy that uses Celtic FC as a platform to satisfy their selfish and self-serving mantra.
– See more at: http://www.celticquicknews.co.uk/tax-man-cometh-scottish-gov-front-after-oba-protests/comment-page-4/#comments
I’ve made it, I think. I am part of a malignant cabal….a caballistic malignancy……Wow!
My Uncle started a Catholic Marxist society in Coatbridge, run out of the Goric when I was at St Pat’s.
Don’t think you can be a Catholic Marxist and a malignant cabalist…. I’ll do my best and try and avoid any clash of ideologies.
Hail Hail
Matt (Who would like to thank everyone for the honour)
Brogan Rogan Trevino and Hogan supports Oscar Knox, MacKenzie Furniss and anyone else who fights Neuroblastoma on 31st March 2016 6:12 pm –
Hahahahahahaha …. Absolutely brilliant…. !!!!